Editorial: $93k for doing (almost) nothing

Disturbingly it seems Queensland’s assistant ministers do not do much for their additional $93,000 a year, writes the editor.

The Queensland government’s “Tower of Power” at 1 William St, Brisbane City

• Transparency: Publish their diaries

Queensland’s assistant ministers earn an additional $93,000 on top of their already generous salaries for performing extra duties. And disturbingly it seems they do not actually do much for it.

Thanks to former premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s refusal to release their diaries, The Courier-Mail had to apply through a Right to Information request.

It cost us $400 to obtain the diary entries for a single year of former assistant minister to the premier for veterans’ affairs and the public sector, Bart Mellish – now the state’s transport minister.

The result? About 200 pages of partially redacted documents that mostly contain vague entries such as “Bart at 1 William Street All Day” and “Parliamentary Sitting Week” – with no further details other than a copy-and-paste of the running schedule of parliament sitting days.

The detail is too vague and general for the government to make the case that the $2000 a week taxpayers forked out for Mr Mellish’s extra duties was money well spent, especially as most diary entries appear to cover duties that he would have performed anyway – such as turning up to a sitting of state parliament.

This is an issue because it goes to the heart of both whether the government is being a good steward of public money and also if these jobs are just essentially made up ways to reward loyal MPs.

Last year The Courier-Mail blew the whistle on assistant ministers’ pay – the highest bonus in the nation – and demanded to see their diaries for evidence of the extra workload that may justify such a top-up to an MP’s base salary of $170,105.

That came as Greens Member for South Brisbane Amy MacMahon called assistant minister appointments “a job-creation program for Labor backbenchers”, saying: “These assistant ministers get paid an eye-watering amount in a cushy job, but no one can explain what work they’re actually doing.”

Ms Palaszczuk responded – in her classic “don’t you worry about that” style – by simply declining to release the diaries.

However, her successor Steven Miles says he is committed to leading an “open and transparent government” and is “considering” the release of assistant minister diaries alongside those of actual ministers, which are already published.

None of this is to say that the role of an assistant minister cannot be a real or important one, nor that Mr Mellish did not earn the cash. It is just that no evidence has yet been presented to show that.

But it’s probably time to rethink what they get paid. Federal assistant ministers, albeit off a higher base salary, receive an extra $56,435 for the role.

In Victoria, it’s $44,591. In South Australia and West Australia it’s under $40,000. And in New South Wales, where the government has 14 parliamentary secretaries, they are paid $22,435 extra for the role.

It is yet another issue for the Premier’s now bulging in-tray. Surely after the events of the past few weeks he would want to kill off any suggestion of jobs for mates.

END THE AIRTRAIN MONOPOLY

As we have pointed out in this page before, the deal signed by the Borbidge government in 1998 to run the Brisbane Airtrain service after its construction has passed its use-by date.

The problem is, we are still stuck with the deal for more than another decade.

The deal locked in Airtrain as the sole operator of public transport, locking out buses from the domestic and international terminals until 2036.

Last November, we reported that then-transport minister Mark Bailey had held negotiations with Airtrain to get out of the contract, with no success.

His successor as Transport Minister, Bart Mellish, has now taken up the mantle, saying he has already met with Brisbane Airport and Brisbane City Council about the issue, and will soon be meeting with Airtrain.

Apart from the exclusivity restricting transport options from BNE, Mr Mellish pointed out the high fares from the airport.

The short 26-minute journey from the domestic airport to Central costs $21.90 – a price that means it is more expensive for a family to use public transport than catch a taxi, and that means the thousands of people who work at the airport will always just drive.

“This is a contract that was entered into by a previous government which basically means that fares are much more than what you would pay across the rest of the rail network, as everyone knows,” Mr Mellish said.

Essentially, Mr Mellish is going to enter into negotiations with a private company – that enjoys a monopoly – and ask them to charge less and give up their exclusivity. Good luck with that! Maybe he will need a bigger stick.

Responsibility for election comment is taken by Chris Jones, corner of Mayne Rd & Campbell St, Bowen Hills, Qld 4006. Printed and published by NEWSQUEENSLAND (ACN 009 661 778). Contact details here